SOURCE: "Fourier and Fourierism," in Socialist Thought: The Forerunners, 1789-1850, Macmillan & Co., 1953, pp. 62-74.

In the following excerpt, Cole offers a brief outline of Fourier's life and a detailed discussion of his philosophy, arguing that the most convincing aspects of Fourier's doctrine regard the organization of labor and social institutions around human desires.

No two persons could well be more different in their approach to the social question than Saint-Simon and Fourier, though they were both precursors of Socialism. Saint-Simon loved vast generalisations and was dominated in all his thinking by the conception of unity. His approach was historical, on a world scale: he saw the coming industrial age as a phase in a grand progress of human development based on the expansion and unification of human knowledge. Fourier, on the other hand, set out always from the individual, from his likes and dislikes, his pursuit of happiness...